is, I suppose . . ."
"Not that at all." Her face was in a half-light and looked as it had when we first met: pale, withdrawn, all the day's color drained out of it. Above the sea, Orion's belt dipped in the deep sky. The evening star all silver set. We were early and had this place to ourselves.
"Then what? Clarissa's motives are always clear, at least to herself. She never does anything that doesn't contribute to some private design . . . though what she's up to half the time I don't dare guess."
Iris smiled. "Nor I. But she is at least up to something which concerns us both and I'm not sure that she may not be right, about the two of us, I mean . . . though of course it's too soon to say."
I was conventional enough at first to assume that Iris was speaking of ourselves, most boldly, in terms of some emotional attachment and I wondered nervously how I might indicate without embarrassment to her that I was effectively withdrawn from all sexuality and that, while my emotions were in no way impaired, I had been forced to accept a physical limitation to any act of affection which I might direct at another; consequently, I avoided as well as I could those situations which might betray me, and distress another. Though I have never been unduly grieved by this incompletion, I had come to realize only too well from several disquieting episodes in my youth that this flaw in me possessed the unanticipated power of shattering others who, unwarily, had moved to join with me in the traditional duet only to find an implacable surface where they had anticipated a creature of flesh like themselves, as eager as they, as governed by the blood's solemn tide: I had caused pain against my will and I did not want Iris hurt.
Fortunately, Iris had begun to move into a different, an unexpected conjunction with me, one which had in it nothing of the familiar or even of the human: it was in that hour beneath Orion's glitter that we were, without warning, together volatilized onto that archetypal plane where we were to play with such ferocity at being gods, a flawed Mercury and a dark queen of heaven, met at the sea's edge, disguised as human beings but conscious of one another's true identity for though our speeches, our arias were all prose, beneath the usual talk recognition had occurred, sounding with the deep resonance of a major chord struck among dissonances. We crossed the first division easily. She was, in her way, as removed as I from the flesh's wild need to repeat itself in pleasure. There was no need for us ever to discuss my first apprehension. We were able to forget ourselves, to ignore the mortal carriage. The ritual began simply enough.
"Clarissa knows what is happening here. That's why she has come West, though she can't bear California. She wants to be in on it the way she's in on everything else, or thinks she is."
"You mean John Cave, your magus ?" It was the first time I had ever said that name: the sword was between us now, both edges sharp.
"You guessed? or did she tell you that was why I came back?"
"I assumed it. I remembered what you said to me last spring."
"He is more than . . . magus , Eugene." And this was the first time she had said my name: closer, closer. I waited. "You will see him." I could not tell if this was intended as a question or a prophecy. I nodded. She continued to talk, her eyes on mine, intense and shining. Over her shoulder the night was black and all the stars flared twice, once in the sky and again upon the whispering smooth ocean at our feet, one real and one illusion: both light.
"It is really happening," she said and then, deliberately, she lightened her voice. "You'll see when you meet him. I know of course that there have been thousands of these prophets, these saviors in every country and in every time. I also know that this part of America is particularly known for religious maniacs. I started with every prejudice, just like you."
"Not prejudice . . . skepticism: perhaps
"Not that at all." Her face was in a half-light and looked as it had when we first met: pale, withdrawn, all the day's color drained out of it. Above the sea, Orion's belt dipped in the deep sky. The evening star all silver set. We were early and had this place to ourselves.
"Then what? Clarissa's motives are always clear, at least to herself. She never does anything that doesn't contribute to some private design . . . though what she's up to half the time I don't dare guess."
Iris smiled. "Nor I. But she is at least up to something which concerns us both and I'm not sure that she may not be right, about the two of us, I mean . . . though of course it's too soon to say."
I was conventional enough at first to assume that Iris was speaking of ourselves, most boldly, in terms of some emotional attachment and I wondered nervously how I might indicate without embarrassment to her that I was effectively withdrawn from all sexuality and that, while my emotions were in no way impaired, I had been forced to accept a physical limitation to any act of affection which I might direct at another; consequently, I avoided as well as I could those situations which might betray me, and distress another. Though I have never been unduly grieved by this incompletion, I had come to realize only too well from several disquieting episodes in my youth that this flaw in me possessed the unanticipated power of shattering others who, unwarily, had moved to join with me in the traditional duet only to find an implacable surface where they had anticipated a creature of flesh like themselves, as eager as they, as governed by the blood's solemn tide: I had caused pain against my will and I did not want Iris hurt.
Fortunately, Iris had begun to move into a different, an unexpected conjunction with me, one which had in it nothing of the familiar or even of the human: it was in that hour beneath Orion's glitter that we were, without warning, together volatilized onto that archetypal plane where we were to play with such ferocity at being gods, a flawed Mercury and a dark queen of heaven, met at the sea's edge, disguised as human beings but conscious of one another's true identity for though our speeches, our arias were all prose, beneath the usual talk recognition had occurred, sounding with the deep resonance of a major chord struck among dissonances. We crossed the first division easily. She was, in her way, as removed as I from the flesh's wild need to repeat itself in pleasure. There was no need for us ever to discuss my first apprehension. We were able to forget ourselves, to ignore the mortal carriage. The ritual began simply enough.
"Clarissa knows what is happening here. That's why she has come West, though she can't bear California. She wants to be in on it the way she's in on everything else, or thinks she is."
"You mean John Cave, your magus ?" It was the first time I had ever said that name: the sword was between us now, both edges sharp.
"You guessed? or did she tell you that was why I came back?"
"I assumed it. I remembered what you said to me last spring."
"He is more than . . . magus , Eugene." And this was the first time she had said my name: closer, closer. I waited. "You will see him." I could not tell if this was intended as a question or a prophecy. I nodded. She continued to talk, her eyes on mine, intense and shining. Over her shoulder the night was black and all the stars flared twice, once in the sky and again upon the whispering smooth ocean at our feet, one real and one illusion: both light.
"It is really happening," she said and then, deliberately, she lightened her voice. "You'll see when you meet him. I know of course that there have been thousands of these prophets, these saviors in every country and in every time. I also know that this part of America is particularly known for religious maniacs. I started with every prejudice, just like you."
"Not prejudice . . . skepticism: perhaps
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